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Australians to Get Compulsory Photo ID Smartcard
syousef writes "The Sydney morning herald reports that a new national ID card will be issued in Australia."From 2010 people will not be able to receive government health and welfare payments without a card. People may choose to have other information stored on the card, such as health and emergency contact details which, for example, ambulance officers could use.". Your papers please."
If you've ever seen the famous German film M (which is made by Fritz Lang--the same director of Metropolis fame), you would recall the scenes in which people are asked for their papers and arrested if they don't have them or they are suspected to be fake. This is in an attempt to crack down on a child molester/murderer.
Why do I pick M and not some modern day movie that reflects this? Because as I watched M, I realized that Fritz Lang was probably commenting on the futility of that system of law enforcement although his audience probably watched it with a "that's just the way it works" attitude. How profound it was to see an act of injustice only to realize that when and where this movie was made it was not at all out of the norm.
I was born in 1982 so I'm sure I don't know the half of how 'papers' work but I do know that I have a social security card, two birth certificates (state and county) and a driver's license. Are these my papers? Maybe they could be construed as such but I highly doubt I would be arrested should I lack any of them. You will, of course, argue with me and tell me I would be considered an illegal alien without the birth certificates. I know this is true most places and I do fear for my country, the United States of America.
The article was very concerned with how much this would cost versus save the Australian government. The article was also very concerned about whether this would crack down on identity theft or make it easier to steal an identity. What I'm concerned about is what happens when you're a suspect of a crime that happened in proximity to you and you don't have your ID card? I'm also very concerned to see whether or not the Aboriginal peoples of Australia will be forced to carry this card.
Are the laws surrounding this card being mandated such that it would be very easy for law enforcement to abuse it? Will this give them an excuse to arrest whom ever they so choose? Identification is easily abused by both the identifiers and those being identified.
My work here is dung.
Oh - and the summary headline "Australians to Get Compulsory Photo ID Smartcard" seems to be incorrect. Quoting the linked article:My understanding is that Australia does have a reasonable health & welfare system, so thats a big carrot (stick?) to wave. But it's still not compulsory.
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
...implant it on the back of my hand? I don't want to have to remember to take it everywhere!
This card is not a full-blown id chip implant, but it is the first step.
I would be weary of the tracking of these cards.
You start people out on a mandatory ID card, then move to mandatory carrying of the card at all times, then you move to tracking the cards remotely, and then your actions/movements are no longer 'free.'
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
This is what happens when you willingly give up your assault weapons!
This is a seriously rediculous statement. I understand the need for privacy, however I don't see how this is any more invasive than requiring a drivers license or a state ID or a passport to get certain benefits as well.
There is good reason for requiring identification for certain benefits to ensure that people don't abuse the system. As of right now, the USA doesn't have a "national ID card", however a drivers license is close enough. Police from any state can take your license and request all of your information.
This system not only simplifies that process, but allows you OPTIONALLY to put in more health and contact information to benefit you if you run into problems.
Passports, State ID Cards, Licenses, are all essentially the same thing. What the hell is the problem?
What happens when a wallet gets stolen? How many hoops do you have to jump through to prove that you are who you say you are, so that you can get a new card? If I lose my credit card, I make a phone call and they cancel it and send me a new one - surely it wouldn't be that easy with some form of national identification.
And like the previous poster stated - how much longer before this really does turn into compulsory chipping (except in Wisconsin)? While I am not afraid of the government, and have nothing to hide, I'm not exactly enamoured by the idea of being required to have some form of absolute ID on me (or in me) at all times.
Where does this all end? Gattica had the nifty system of checking DNA for everything...will the Police officer someday just ask for a strand of hair? I like my bodily fluids, and I don't want to give them away, especially not for something as mundane as identification...it would be okay to give them to the proverbial "female".
Take it to the limit, everybody to the limit, come on, everybody fhqwhgads.
I've debated other Libertarians on this issue, and the main point they can not refute is, "So what?"
In nearly all 50 of these United States, you are required to carry some form of ID, usually a driver's license. Once you cross state lines, your ID is no longer familiar to those who may want to look at it (airport ticket counter, liquor store cashier, hotel clerk, police officer, EMT) and thus becomes easier to forge. A national ID instead of 50 differnt state ID's could help prevent this sort of thing and make absolutely no difference people's lives, as we are all required to carry a state ID already.
I've carried a state ID for over 20 years, and I've never had anyone ask to see my papers.
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
Excellent. After living in Australia for 6 years I've moved back to NZ. Whilst we do occasionally do ridiculous things wrt environmental issues, our general method of governance is much much `pre-9-11' (as people say ^_^). Maybe that's because we're an outdated backwater; but whatever the reason, at least we avoid lunacy like this. In case anybody doesn't know by now, we have also effectively banned any US ship from entering out waters (although how we do that is not something I agree with; we are `nuclear free' which, although prevents any US ship from visiting, also means we are nuclear free).
NZ is sort of like Amiga OS (or perhaps I should say *BSD? ^_~)... secure and free mostly by obfuscation and isolation =^_^=.
The Shoes of the Fisherman's Wife Are Some Jive Ass Slippers
"Mr. President! We must not allow a privacy-shaft gap!"
Thank you, Edward Snowden.
"Arguments from authority are worthless." —Carl Sagan
As has been repeatedly pointed out about the UK government's (well, a handful of senior members') insistence on introducing a 'voluntary' ID card, it's going to be a windfall for IT consultants if the debacle of the NHS patient database project is anything to go by. I'm polishing my golden wheelbarrow as I type. Quite fancy six months or so in Oz too.
The problem with these smartcards, RFID, etc. is actually quite simple:
I can't choose not to provide a piece of info that's on it.
If they had a way for me to control which information from them I want to reveal, there would be much less trouble, I'm sure. Then I could have a single ID card with all my financial, medical, etc. info on it, but you only get whatever I explicitly give you.
And no, implementing that in the clients, say programming the doc's computer so it only reads the medical data, is not good enough.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Maybe it's because there's no better way to file this, but this seems to be less "Your Rights Online" and more "Your Rights in the Real World." Just an observation.
Slashdot: 24 hours behind every other site or your money back!
This PM promised that there would never be a GST, so saying it's not an ID card does not suprise anyone in Oz. Just because he doesn't call it an ID card, doesn't mean that it doesn't function like one. An Election is due in a year so let the voters decide.
There was an unknown error in the submission.
Bruce Schneier wrote an op-ed a couple years back on why a national ID doesn't offer any more security. Interesting reading, to say the least: http://www.schneier.com/essay-034.html
I'm interested in what the law of Australia states. Would it be possible for someone to be arrested simply because they don't have their ID card?
Maybe if you had read the linked article, instead of frantically going for an apparently well thought out first post, you'd have read that it is NOT compulsory to carry the ID card in question at all times. In other words, you'll carry it when you expect you'll need it. I always carry my Medicare card and I will probably also always carry this ID card.
I am not worried about what the Australian government or police will do with this opportunity. I am however worried about the design and implementation of the technology. Regardless of whether the government develops the card and support system in-house or with contractors, they have a tendancy to fuck things like this up, with beurocratic bullshit getting in the way of proper design and implementation. Which I suppose is mostly typical of governments around the World.
I would really like to get my hands on one with some known details on the card to check it for myself. Hopefully the format of the data stored on the cards will be version numbered to allow automatic updates when needed at trusted points of use (hospitals, post offices, etc), so that the cards details can be updated to reflect critical changes in the back-end systems.
Much like the UK ID Card coming soon. The Gov said it would be optional to have one, then tried to rail-road anyone getting a passport (new or renewal) into having one. Luckily, the Lords put a stop to that, and initially at least it will be optional for you to take the ID Card when you get your next passport. Of course, you will still be charged for it, and all the information will still be logged into the central database whether you take the card or not.
I renewed my passport this year so I won't be forced into having an ID Card for 10 years! I'd strongly suggest that you consider doing the same!
Of course, first it's optional to have one, or too many people would object! The next step is obviously to make it a legal requirement to own such a card, but it would never be mandatory to carry it. Give it a couple of years however, and a new law WILL make it an offence not to carry your ID Card.
It's common sense (for the Gov!). There's no point having ID Cards unless everyone has them, and there's no point having them unless everyone carries the damn things. Of course, what's the point in carrying them if no one ever asks to see them ...
Papers please
It won't help the public with their normal everyday lives, but it will help the Gov. control you.
Just Say NO!
Eclectic beats from Leeds, UK
handmadehands.co.uk
why not just create a Certificate Authority for the Federal Government? Then mandate that all driver's licenses and passports have a smart chip with a certificate signed by the government and your own personal public key, also signed by the government. A separate card could be issued with your private key on it. As a backup, encode the certificate for the ID card in a barcode on the back, so your ID can be verified even if the chip fails.
If you want to get rid of the separate card for the private key, come up with an algorithm for hashing other biometric data to make a private key: retinal scan and/or thumbprint.
If properly implemented, there would be two virtues to this system. The first is, after the initial check by the issuer that the issuee is who they say they are, no central database query is need to authenticate the ID. Each ID reader just needs a copy of the government's public key. After almost 10 years of Web Browser PKI experience, this system should be well-understood. The second virtue is, if every citizen has a public and private key pair, then check and credit card fraud could be eliminated. Those systems currently rely on insecure methods like written signatures, very short pins, or codes on the back of the physical cards. It would also be possible to easily encrypt e-mail, keep phone calls private, and transmit legally binding electronic documents.
Bruce Schneier points out that any ID card system will be flawed from the start because there is a human element in issuing and checking ID's. Biometrics and PKI would help, but perhaps not enough. At the very least, my proposal wouldn't be a worse ID system then we currently have, and actually provides two possible benefits we didn't have before. On the other hand, governments don't like strong encryption in the hands of citizens, so we would have to watch for backdoors in the system. There may also be a concern with the fact that your public key can now tie you to your various activities. Of course, this is pretty much the case now. Though, there are many virtues to a world where PKI is widely used.
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In X-Windows the client serves YOU!
if you dont think that kind of thing goes on here in the USA, read this story about a women who was put in jail because she did not show her "papers" on a public bus while not breaking any laws... http://www.papersplease.org/davis/index1.html